“So she was left holding the bag, so to speak.” They both turned when CJ said it had been more than that. “I’m sorry. This is very rude of me to ask about your life when you’re perfectly fine to answer on your own.”
“It’s fine. This is what I was just explaining to the idiot here. Why I have no desire to take on another person that is going to demand I do things his way. I hadn’t really realized that until after he was arrested—that it wasn’t just that he loved me, but he’d ordered me to love him. I don’t have any heart left to love anyone. Just my family.” Pfeiffer watched Don as she explained the rest of what had happened. “I was humiliated when he was taken away. Not by anyone that I knew, but he put it out there that I was a double agent working for several countries that were paying me well for what I knew. What he’d not counted on was the fact that we had nothing. Less than nothing. My mom was still alive then, and we were all living with her in the same home. There wasn’t any evidence to back up his story. However, our lives were looked through so hard that it was difficult to even get a home loan for either of us. Much less a car loan. We’d been red-flagged, they told us.”
“But you’re thriving now.” Pfeiffer said they were, but not by much. She told Don that if they had one large or even medium-sized issue, they’d be back to nothing again. “I can and will help you with that if you need it.”
“We’re not going to be on your list of charities. Have you listened to a single thing I’ve said to you?” Don told CJ he was talking to her sister at the moment, not her. “She’s fine. I have a job that is paying well.”
“You do, honey. And I love you for it. But with Rachel out of work right now and Sally being here with us, the income we did have nearly dried up.” Pfeiffer knew she was poking the bear with her sister, but she looked at Don. “You could help us? I’d pay you back for whatever you deem a good interest rate. I’ve no way to work on the things I do and put a little by for the off chance of an emergency. Even staying here, we’re still going to have to pay the taxes when they come due. Also, there are the other little things that happen when you’re as broke as we are all the time.”
“I can understand that very well. But something you need to remember, even if your sister is ten kinds of stubborn, is that you’re my family now too. All of you, as soon as I met CJ, became my responsibility. I know that sounds old-fashioned, but I sincerely mean it when I tell you I will do everything in my power to keep you safe and without the stress of being without funds.” She told him she wasn’t his mate. “But you’re her sister. And that alone means you’re just as important to me as she is. And your daughters and Grannie. Who, I might add, is being much more cooperative than CJ is.”
“Because she thinks you’re the cat’s meow. Whatever the hell that is supposed to mean.” CJ sat down and looked as if she was going to cry. In all the years they’d been living together, she’d not once see her sister looking so defeated. “I lost my job this morning. The company I was working with on the program design fired me. In turn, several of the other companies I’m working for did the same thing. It’s as if someone has put a black mark by my name, and I can’t even get a job designing logos right now. I can’t find out who it was because I can’t get into my computers here. The Internet service here isn’t secure enough for me to chance looking into anything.”
“I can help you with that.” CJ looked at Don, and there was such hope there on her sister’s face that she was sure that Don couldn’t have not noticed it. “Did you know that Kelly works for the Feds? She’s been working for them for a while now and has a very secure network in the basement here. I could ask her if you could plug into it. Not that I think she’d have a problem with you doing that without asking, but I’d like to do that for you.”
“Why?” Don asked CJ what she meant. “Why would you do this for me when you know I’m as stubborn as a mule and that I’ve turned you down every time you open your mouth about us? Which there isn’t one.”
“Because you need to figure this out, and I can help you with it. I’m a nice guy when you let me be. You’ve been bitching and fighting with me at every turn. I’m not going to hurt you in any way, shape or form, CJ. I swear to you that my only intentions right now are to make you happy and to keep everyone here safe.” She told him, and Pfeiffer knew, that she’d not meant to be a bitch, but that she’d not been happy for a very long time. In fact, she told Don she wasn’t sure how to be that way anymore. “I’m sorry for that. I truly am. But I can take some of the burden off you if you’d allow me to. I won’t touch you until you want me to. I promise you that.”
Instead of saying anything more, CJ got up from the table and left them there. Don started to go with her, but Gwyneth told him to wait for a little bit. Don looked at her and asked if he’d said something wrong to her.
“Don’t promise her anything you have no intention of making come to fruition. She trusts that everyone who uses that word is only saying what they think she wants to hear. As I said, she’s been hurt. Not just by Mike, but by a lot of people.” Pfeiffer looked at him then and told him something she knew she shouldn’t. “You’d be blown away by how many people owe her money. I’ve seen the invoices she sends out and how they’re past due, some of them for the past few years of nonpayment. Not your fault, and I’m sure she knows that too, but promises mean nothing to her after being burnt so many times. Even our mother made promises that she never intended to keep. Grannie, I think, is the only person in this world that she trusts more than she does even herself.”
“Do you have a list of the people who owe her?” Pfeiffer said she did. “I’d like it, please. Not that I’ll go behind her back, but I can check out the reason they’re not paying her. It might be something as simple as they’re having money issues. I don’t believe that, not for this long past due, but I would like to see what I can find out about each of the companies.”
She wrote down the names she could remember. There were a lot more, she told him, but she didn’t know all their names. When she handed what she could remember over to him, she put her hand over his.
“She won’t be happy with either of us if you fuck this up. And while she might not be able to hurt you herself, you can bet that I won’t have any qualms about selling my soul to someone to have your throat ripped out. Do you understand me? She’s my baby sister, and I won’t have you treading over her heart so you can get a good lay.” Don nodded, then smiled at her. “Why on earth do you find that to be funny?”
“Grannie said the same thing to me not an hour ago. What she also told me was that if I fucked around and didn’t make her fall in love with me, and soon, that she’d castrate me. I believed her, and now you. But I won’t hurt her if I can help it. Never physically. I might hurt her by helping her, but I don’t think that is what you mean.” She told him it wasn’t. “Then good. We’re on the same page.” He stood up and didn’t leave right away but looked to the doorway where CJ had gone. “There will be money enough to keep you from worrying by the end of the day if you’ll give me your information. Also, you should know that I, too, have been hurt, but not by a woman. My father. I’ll tell you about it someday. But for now, thank you for trusting me with this. You’ve no idea how much this means to me.”
“See that you don’t fuck it up.” He said he’d not then kissed her on the forehead. Looking at Gwyneth, she asked if she’d just made it worse. “I don’t want either of them hurt, but if she can have someone love her, a forever love, then I’ll help as much as I can.”
“Don is a good boy, Pfeiffer. One of the best, next to my grandson. When he says he’ll do something, you can bank on it unless something else comes along to keep him from doing it.” Pfeiffer said she could understand that. “Good girl. Now, do you need anything from me to get the rest of this project finished up?”
“No. Just leave me to it, and I’ll have them organized in no time.” Most of it was already done, Gwyneth pointed out as she l
eft the room. “I work when I’m stressed.”
Gwyneth was still laughing when she left the room. These were an odd bunch of people. They all laughed at the strangest things. Pulling another pile to her, Pfeiffer got to work on it. She didn’t know what she was in for, but for now, she was doing something she loved. Organizing.
~*~
Don just sat on the deck when he noticed that CJ was talking. It took him several minutes to realize she wasn’t speaking to herself as he had thought but to a faerie. He wondered then how she’d ended up with a faerie. It must be a wonderful story. Watching her, he saw her turn to look at him before she finally stood up. That was when he noticed that not only did she not have on a coat, but no shoes either. She sat in the other chair, and the faerie sat on his bent knee.
“I’m Cody.” Don told him he was happy to meet him. “Thank you, sir. I have some information I can share with you. It’s about Ms. CJ here. She’s got a man looking for her. Not a company as I thought at first, but a single man. I’ve told her that—”
“Why are you telling me, Cody, and not my mate?” He glanced over at CJ, then back at him. “Has she told you she’s not speaking to me, or—?”
“No, I didn’t tell him shit. He’s telling you so I can think about what he said. But if you want to think everything revolves around you, then I’ll tell you. The person who is looking for me is a vampire. Old, but that’s about all he knows. Cody also told me I don’t know him.” Don asked if she knew why he was looking for her. “Bancroft. This vampire, who I wasn’t aware of him being a vamp, is one of the many people I knew were looking for the other man, but I don’t know why. Again, because of the Internet situation.”
“What’s his name?” She told him. “I’ve heard that name before. I can ask around to the other vamps here and see what they might know about Parker. I think his name was associated with a kiss that was raided some years ago that was killing humans for the pleasure of it.”
“That would be him. And in the event you aren’t aware of it yet, I’m the one that reported them to the council. To be honest with you, I had no idea anything had been done to it until just this morning when I was speaking to Gwyneth. She told me that Bancroft hadn’t done anything then, as he wasn’t the lord of the vampires.” Don asked her how she’d found the kiss. “I used to work for the council finding nests—what I was told they were called—for them to clean them out. I did wonder what had happened to the men that would ask for help. I guess Lord Vampire is in charge of it now.”
“He is. But I’m betting that if asked, he had no idea that you were helping them out. It seemed to me and a great many others that they were only out for the profit of having their jobs. Robbing from other vamps.” She looked at him and told him what she’d found out. “Ah, so they would call you to find them then clean them out. Of not just vampires, but the things they had stashed away too. That sounds like them.”
“Should I offer him my services? I mean, it’s not that hard to figure out once you know what you’re looking for.” He asked her how she knew it was a nest. “I can see them going in and out of the building at certain times of the day. But there are no heat signatures around them unless they’d just fed. Which, it occurred to me just now, wasn’t all that often. What does that mean?”
“It could have been because they were old. But I’m doubting that. Older vampires, like me and Bancroft, have been around long enough to know that nests aren’t the way to go. They’ll get you killed faster than anything.” She looked out across the yard. “I’m sure that you asking to help Bancroft will be something he’d like. He’s new to this lord stuff, but you can bet he is really good at it.”
“I’m supposed to offer you a faerie.” Don asked her why she thought he’d need one. Not that he was turning her down, but why. “About ten years ago, just after my sister’s husband died, I was grieving in private. I didn’t much like Robert—I thought him incredibly lazy. But Pfeiffer loved him and his children. So I tolerated him. Anyway, while I was hiding out, I came across something I didn’t understand. It was a woman that was fading in and out of focus. I got closer to her, just to see if my eyesight was going when she turned to me. She was bleeding badly from a wound at her throat. I didn’t even take a second to consider the consequences of my actions and offered my wrist to her. Then I hid her out in the building I owned and kept an eye on her.”
“The faerie queen, I’m guessing.” She nodded at him without looking in his direction. “She was gone from her castle for about a week when it happened if I remember correctly. No one knew where she’d gone, and some were worried she’d been harmed. However, when she returned, she never told anyone what had transpired, but she was a good deal more cautious after that. I’m assuming she repaid you in some way that pissed you off.”
“Yes. I won’t even ask you how you knew that. But she did repay me with magic. A good deal of it, as a matter of fact. And she gifted me Cody, who has been with me since. We’re good for each other.” He asked her if that was why he needed a faerie too. “I was speaking to her a little while ago. She comes to see me when she feels the earth move. I guess it did when you were holding me down.”
“I felt it. Did you?” She told him she might have been too pissed off to have noticed. “Does she want to see me?”
“She’s here now. And she told me she knows you and the other vampires already.” He nodded, and when the wind picked up a little and small sparkles of light began to curl around like a small air eddy, he stood up and got down on one knee. “You do know what you’re doing is going to piss her off, don’t you?”
“Yes. He knows.” He glanced up at Melisandre when she spoke. “Get up, you old fool, before I put a hex on you that will make it so you never will be able to satisfy your new mate.”
“You don’t have to worry about that one. I’ll do it if he gets the least bit frisky with me.” Melisandre sat down on one of the chairs, and so did Don. “I was just telling him how you were hurt.”
“I’m sure she played down her part in saving me a great deal. What did she say that she found me and gave me some blood? That would be like her to do that. However, I was there, and I know she not only found me, but she found me with several men who thought it would be a good deal of sport to rape me. I didn’t have the strength to fight them off, as I had only just made the flowers for spring open. It took a great deal out of me. She not only killed all six of them but also made sure I was put in a safe place to rest. Six men, without so much as a weapon to her name but her wits.” Melisandre looked at CJ. “She has been gifted with magic, Don, but she’s never used any of it. A great deal of it was given to her by many creatures of the earth too. It would have saved her a great deal of grief from the bastard that tried to marry her.”
“She’s proven to me that she’s very capable of taking care of herself. With or without magic.” Don watched the two of them. He wondered if either of them knew how much they looked alike. “I’m going to ask this because if I don’t, it will haunt me. Melisandre, what is CJ to you?”
The smile from the queen was very telling. It was also sort of scary. The connection between the two of them might not be anything at all, but for some reason, Don thought there was a great deal more to it than just one helping the other.
Chapter 2
Fergus needed something to do. If he didn’t find a job of some sort soon, he was going to have to go back west and miss seeing his daughter. Not that they were terribly close, but she was coming to him for things now. However, none of it was keeping his mind or his hands busy. Going to find Don, he sat in his office for several minutes before the man looked up from the device, a computer he was staring at.
“I’m trying to find us a home. All I think about is that I have a mate, and I get sidetracked very easily.” His smile seemed to consume his entire face. Ah, to be in love again. “What can I do for you, Fergus?”
“I can write a check.” Th
at sounded silly even to his own ears. “I’m sorry. I’m very bored. And you know as well as I that being bored is dangerous for men such as us. Do you, by chance, have anything for me to do? Physically would be better, but even a mental challenge is better than I have right now.”
“I have several projects going right now. Two of them are things I’ve been asked by Bancroft and Kelly to do, and one of them is something I’ve been mulling around for the last few days. What do you know about construction?” He told him that several times in his life, he’d been in construction for a time. “Good. Even if it was a while back, it’s more than I have right now. I need to see what sort of work it would take to change out the school that has been sitting idle for decades. Should it be taken down? Can I reuse it the way it is? I need someone that knows more than I do to go there and see if it would be cheaper to rip it to the ground or renovate it into a greenhouse flower shop. I think the need is there, especially for the greenhouse. And I found out recently that my mate is a cousin to Melisandre.”
“I thought she’d been created. I mean, isn’t that the way it is for queens and kings of the other world?” Don explained it to him. “I had no idea that Melisandre was the second queen. So Melisandre’s mother is a sister to the father of CJ. What about her sister?”
“They’re not related. Not by blood anyway. CJ knows, but her sister Pfeiffer doesn’t. Apparently, when there was an upheaval in the other world, CJ was brought here to this world to be safely hidden away in the event she was needed to take over the other world for the queen. If she was hurt or incapacitated in some way, they had someone that could hopefully fill the spot. It turned out all right, but they forgot about CJ being with a human family, and she has been here since.” He asked about the parents. “That’s the thing. When Pfeiffer’s parents were alive, they traveled a great deal. Then one time, when they came home with a baby, no one seemed to be confused or concerned about it. Pfeiffer, just like everyone else, thought CJ was their child and her sister. That’s why there are a lot of years between them.”
Donald: Dalton’s Kiss: Vampire Paranormal Romance (Dalton's Kiss Book 3) Page 3
